something to lie about this time," and he advanced to the attack with
a grim determination not pleasant for his cousin to behold.

Finding that there was no escape, George turned upon him with so
shrill a curse that it even frightened from his leafy perch in the oak
above the tame turtle-dove, intensely preoccupied as he was in cooing
to a new-found mate. He did more than curse; he fought like a cornered
rat, and with as much chance as the rat with a trained fox-terrier. In
a few seconds his head was as snugly tucked away in the chancery of
his cousin's arm as ever any property was in the court of that name,
and, to speak truth, it seemed quite possible that, when it emerged
from its retreat, it would, like the property, be much dilapidated and
extensively bled.

Let us not dwell upon the scene; for George it was a very painful one,
so painful that he never quite forgot it. His nose, too, was never so
straight again. It was soon over, though to one of the parties time
went with unnatural slowness.

"Well, I think you've had about enough for once," soliloquized Philip,
as he critically surveyed the writhing mass on the ground before him;
and he looked a very handsome lad as he said it.

His curly black hair hung in waving confusion over his forehead, and
flung changing lights and shadows into the depths of his brown eyes,
whilst his massive and somewhat heavy features were touched into a
more active life by the light of that pleasing excitement which
animates nine men out of every ten of the Anglo-Saxon race when they
are engaged on killing or hurting some other living creature. The
face, too, had a certain dignity about it, a little of the dignity of